


On Mother's Lap - Adrien Talking to a Statue (Short Story)

by bugaboo0scrambles



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Accepting, Adrien Agreste Needs Help, Adrien Agreste Needs a Hug, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bitter-sweet, Dead Emilie Agreste, Light Angst, Mourning, One Shot, Recovery, Sad, Short Story, The Agreste Family, The Agreste Family DRAMA, dead mom, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-28
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:40:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21998398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bugaboo0scrambles/pseuds/bugaboo0scrambles
Summary: It's been a while since his mother's 'disappearance' and honestly, Adrien Agreste doesn't know what to do. He tries to ignore it or block out his feelings, but his father is taking that path and . . . he's not doing the best. Adrien, at this point, doesn't seem to have anyone to talk to and his daily schedule is growing longer each passing day with photoshoots, Chinese practice, or his fencing tournaments. So it already feels like he can't breathe or have a moment of peace. Yet with time, Adrien learns what he must do, but needs some advice. So he goes to the only person he could even really talk to.His mother.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15





	On Mother's Lap - Adrien Talking to a Statue (Short Story)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [To Me](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=To+Me).



> Adrien talks to his (Maybe-Dead) Mother

People will never remember the day they were first held in their parent’s arms, but they will feel and recognize their mother’s embrace or the throbbing of her heartbeat drumming against their ear when she comforts them. Learning to cherish the warmth of her meals or the cool drives to school in the early, winter mornings. Appreciating the home-diagnosis of illnesses as a fresh hand presses against one’s forehead. Or the shouting that beckons one downstairs to help with groceries or memorizing the script their parents repeat when they get a scolding for rolling their eyes.

All the little niches of home-life and the precious recollections are embedded between the pages in fragile family photo albums. Moments in a now distant-reality that a boy with everything will never have again.

His family isn’t together.

His mother is gone.

Period.

In the beginning, Adrien Agreste needed to step back and process how great his loss is. How this will change the rest of his years and the house he confidently called home once.

Settling for the sun-baked stone left out in the garden of roses for a mom. Nuzzling his face in the crook of his arms before setting his head on her solid lap. His sleeves pulled over his fists. Nervously picking at the seams and yarn. Distressing it as much as his heartstrings were.

“Mother,” He said before his voice quivered ever so slightly.

“Do you think I should forgive him?”

In the western shows that plagued late-night television or movie screens, they often aired high school stories or coming-of-age tales. Living the most normal or diverse lives as they did their homework the night before it was due. Sitting around with friends or plugging themselves to their phone until something interesting happened (which was usually around ten minutes into the flim).

Nevertheless, they all have something to go home to. From the neat trailer parks to the dusty suburbs. From the close-knit ghettos or cluttered apartments. There was always something to come back too. A family waiting to come together. A stove with something cooking or a fridge waiting to be plundered.

Adrien watched millions of titles in his childhood, eating them up as if they were goodies after Halloween night. Watching them long enough to identify the actors and their love interests, memorizing the plots of some, certain scenes from another or a single line that could define the movie altogether. Sometimes his flat-screen TV played the movies on repeat on certain nights or didn’t stop playing till the sun peaked over the horizon the next morning. All as he wrapped himself in his thick covers and woke up with a pain in his neck. 

Buying more movies with his allowance and replaying them since they were the only snippet of ‘real’ life he had in his possession. Exposing him to different lives and points of view as the characters went out to find themselves. All as Adrien found himself in the same spot every Friday night.

Each movie presented a new experience that Adrien would engulf himself in. He was a spy helping lost aliens, a nerd looking for a date to the dance, a lawyer that finally had the advantage after years of being the underdog, a writer trying to make it big or even a free man exploring the everlasting sunset of the open ocean. He became so involved with their lives and stories that those characters became a part of him, reinforcing certain wishes and hopes in him. Making him realize what he really wanted.

Not another bike or pinball machine or world-wide trip or a silver watch to wear to those elaborate dinner parties he constantly felt anxious and sweaty in or another fountain pen that had his name engraved. No, not that. What he really wanted were simple and cheap joys of life.

However, if they were really that simple in the end, he wouldn’t have to go to bed starving for them.

Sniffing up his tears when he grew more frustrated with each reject or light ‘maybe’. Burying his face in his pillow before he could calm down. Each year was more difficult than the last since asking for permission felt like presenting a case to an inflexible court. Determine to say guilty without hearing his suit.

In the beginning, refusal was reasoned out with duties and values.

“Adrian, I- Your father is a busy man. He can’t always be with us for dinner.”

“Adrien, son. You have to focus on your studies. I heard from your tutor that your Chinese isn’t as fluid as it once was. How can I let you out there if you’re not taking care of your responsibilities here?”

“Oh, Adrien. I would prefer if you watch the movie here, really. Movie theaters aren’t the cleanest and it’s flu season. The family has connections with the director so we work something out-” 

“Adrien, please. Your mother sick and needs to rest. Go to your room before you wake her up.”

“Adrien, your father is not in the best … -mindset. He needs time alone.”

“Adrien. Get ready before the car picks you up for your fencing class.”

Those dismissals just seem plain offensive as time passed. Hushed without another word, being told to finish his meal before it got cold.

However, what was more shameful was the fact he never spoke up or even talk back. 

It wasn’t until the disappearance of a beloved blonde that triggered an awful period in the Agreste Mansion, the start of a Miserable Revolution if you will. As reporters were flooding Nathalie’s line, his father (if we should even call him that) locked himself in his office under lock and key. Never speaking to his son, unless the business needed him.

Eating dinner wasn’t as enjoyable as it was before. The dull atmosphere made Adrien lose his appetite more times than the chief could count.

Adrien went out to fencing class more often. The only time he was really out of the dark house was spent being sweaty and tired, but it all better than sitting in his room waiting for a miracle to happen.

Fencing as gracefully as it can be- was driven by action. Letting the young teen relieve that anger pinching his shoulders. The same anger and frustration that made  
his back too stiff to get a good-night sleep.

Chinese and piano lessons were time-consuming and grew to be a bit irritating when he didn’t get the keys or pronunciation right. While the newly added photoshoots felt 'artificial’ and strange. Making him feel more disconnected than he already was.

The only thing that seemed to bring him back from that limbo state was his old DVDs in his cabinets and drawers. Rediscovering them after shuffling around his room for a distraction. By 7 pm, he had organized his shelves and surrounded himself with a circle of movie classics and old favorites that hopefully aged as well as the wine in the house’s cellar. 

Slowly, he went down his old system of watching and repeating, watching and ejecting one to put in another DVD. In a way, it helped him mourn. The comedy let him smile for a moment, the plot made him forget everything, and the emotional bits made it easier for him to cry. Comfort him when Nathalie’s schedules and his father’s silent couldn’t.

However, they hurt more at times then relief.

It made it more apparent that he was missing something in his life.

Starving for any air outside of the huge mansion that was shut with security systems, gates, and bodyguards. Not helping the aching in his heart for a friend his age or a day out in the mall or REAL teachers to teach and correct him on his classwork or socks with funky designs that his father wouldn’t approve of or a group of friends to sit and talk to while eating the not-so-pleasant cafeteria food in a public school or and the thing he knew he may never get, a nagging mother.

Not one to tell him to clean his room, no one to give him a heart-to-heart talk he’s heartbroken, no one to tell him to look at this and that when they’re out shopping and no one to push away when they beg to pick at his acne when he’s grown used to it.

Even as the idea mellowed in his head, it still managed to give him a heart attack.

Adrien squeezed his arms tighter. Feeling his eyes get squshed against his forearms, knowing that it would add to the redness on his face.

Instead of his mother’s butter-like tone, he was left with a stone statue that spoke more than the snake surrounded by silks and threads inside.

Adrien came to the terms and conditions of his position. He was the son of the rich, famous, and had everything he required. Yet, this life wasn’t what he wanted. Adrien had to get out of here before he became crazy. All as his father, on the other hand, thought otherwise. Rejecting his son’s pled to go to public school all in the harsh way possible.

By grounding him.

“I just don’t agree with this. And I already know what you’re going to say.” Giving a chuckle that sounded more like the rough wheeze as his deflating lungs gasp for air. As if they would preparing to get drowned out by another set of sobs. Lifting his head up while his eyes squinted at the sun. Adjusting to the brightness as his eyelashes fluttered.

“-'Your father shows his love in a distinctive and subtle way.’ But mother, this isn’t about love.” Biting his lip as if that sentence made his mouth bitter. Not sure if he wanted to hide his pain or spill it out in the open much like how the morning sun shined over the garden of roses.

“It’s not concern or affection or a sense of protection.“ Adrien sniffed.

"It’s plain right dissociation.”

“ And … That’s not a family.” He hushed, afraid of the conclusion he came to. Delivering it as a whisper, not wanting to break his mother on the reality that played out without her near.

Adrien held himself tightly, rubbing circles on his shoulders. Closing his eyes as he prayed for a sign to tell him what she felt. Something to show him that she’s there. Holding him even if he’s the only one there. Whispering in his ear that it’s okay, everything will be fine. Time will pass. Things will heal.

Swiftly, the cool breeze around him warmed up. A sunray managed to weave its way around the rosebushes to hit his shiny hair. Lifting the boy’s head to glance at his mother’s smile down on him. The sunlight caught his mom’s eyes, glimmering the bits of crystal in them. Reminding him of the real thing.

“Thanks, Mom.” Adrien beamed. Biting his lip before he let out another sob. “I knew I could count on you.”

Dropping his head down back to his mother’s lap.

**Author's Note:**

> Find more of my work on Tumblr @bugaboowritings 
> 
> -this work has been updated and edited since it was last posted. 
> 
> Have a great 2020 y'all!!!


End file.
